What are the Different Ways to Connect to the Internet

There are a number of ways of connecting a client’s computer to internet. These are:

Dial Up Connection:

With the help of Dial up connections, the user can connect to the Internet via a telephone line and an ISP (Internet Service Provider). It is one of the cheapest methods of connecting to the internet but it compromises with the speed it provides to the users.

These are used for specific tasks only in which there is no need of having too much high bandwidth.

ISDN

Telephone companies install ISDN digital switch equipment which can be used to connect to internet. ISDN’s use digital modem that sends and receives digital signals through ISDN lines. To use the ISDN access to the Internet, an ISP has to offer the ISDN access. ISDN lines are expensive than normal phone lines, so the telephone rates are usually high.

Cable TV Connection

Cable TV connection requires the subscription to cable television and internet services as well. This gives with a typically higher speed and is almost 70 times faster than the dial- up connections. The user can stay connected to the Internet all time by just opening a browser window to access the Internet. Benefit of cable modem is that its performance is not dependent on the distance from cable office.

DSL (Digital Subscriber Line)

Digital Subscription Line provides High speed data service to the users. It works on POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) copper telephone lines. The installation of higher-grade cable is also not costly and is provided by various telephone companies. ADSL (Asymmetric DSL) is also a type of DSL that provides different bandwidths in upstream as well as downstream directions which gives a user a much higher downstream speed.

In addition to these services, a user can connect to the internet wirelessly, i.e. no need of wires or cables is there for getting access to the internet. Wireless technology is being used vastly now- a- days as the users can access the internet using their mobile connections and can use when and where they need. Wi-Fi networks, cellular services, Wi-Max are also few services of Wireless networks which are widely being used. The difference lies in terms of the connectivity, reliability and cost of these services.